In a powerful demonstration of remembrance, resilience, and responsibility, Israeli President Isaac Herzog and First Lady Michal Herzog will lead the 2025 March of the Living on Thursday, marching from Auschwitz to Birkenau alongside Polish President Andrzej Duda.
Held on Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day, the march marks 80 years since the liberation of the Nazi death camps and the end of World War II, serving as both a tribute to the victims of the Holocaust and a stark reminder of the growing threat of global antisemitism.
A poignant aspect of this year’s program is the participation of a delegation of survivors and heroes of the October 7 Hamas terror attacks. Organized by the Menomadin Foundation and led by philanthropist Haim Taib, the delegation includes former hostages, bereaved families, and IDF soldiers. The message they bring, “Never Again Is Now,” draws a direct and urgent line between the atrocities of the Holocaust and the resurgence of antisemitic violence today.
Among them is Daniel Weiss of Kibbutz Be’eri, whose parents were murdered on October 7. He will perform “Shir HaMa’alot” at the main ceremony in Birkenau alongside Agam Berger, a young violinist and fellow October 7 survivor who was held captive in Gaza for 482 days. Berger will play a 130-year-old violin that survived the Holocaust.
The March will be joined by 80 Holocaust survivors – 40 from Israel and 40 from around the world – many of whom were liberated from Auschwitz, Birkenau, Buchenwald, Mauthausen, and other Nazi camps. Others survived in hiding or as children rescued by Righteous Among the Nations. These survivors, aged 80 to 97, will walk with their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren – each step a living testament to endurance and legacy.
This year’s March pays special tribute to the Allied forces who liberated the camps, led by General Dwight D. Eisenhower. His great-grandson, Merrill Eisenhower, will join the march, walking beside Rabbi Israel Meir Lau, a child survivor of Buchenwald who met General Eisenhower shortly after liberation. President Herzog’s own family legacy intersects with this history: His father, President Chaim Herzog, helped liberate Bergen-Belsen as an officer in the British Army, and his grandfather, Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Herzog, met Eisenhower in 1946 on a mission to rescue Holocaust survivors.
The Birkenau ceremony will be led by March of the Living Chairman Dr. Shmuel Rosenman and include an address by President Herzog. IDF Chief Cantor Lt. Col. Shai Abramson will perform prayers and songs, including a duet in Yiddish with Holocaust survivor Sarah Weinstein. Seven ceremonial torches will be lit, each symbolizing values such as heroism, human dignity, resistance, and rebirth – linking the past to the future. One torch will be lit jointly by a Warsaw Ghetto fighter and her granddaughter, alongside tech leaders representing Israel’s future.
Source link
